How to record Employee Wage Subsidy Scheme (EWSS)

This article is for businesses that are in receipt of the EWSS payment from Revenue. It's a payment introduced by the government to provide supports for businesses impacted by the pandemic. 

1. Create a nominal on your Profit & Loss section under the section Other Income > Grant 82000. Click on Tools>Nominals>Other Income>Grant 82000> and click on New, type in nominal name EWSS Grant and click on Save.

2. You also need to create a control nominal on your Balance Sheet. Click on Tools>Nominals>Current Liabilities. If you've already set up sub-nominals of Payroll 22000 eg. for Wages Control and PAYE/PRSE/USC/LPT then you can add another sub-nominal called EWSS. Click on Payroll 82000 and click on New and type in nominal name EWSS Control and click on Save.

If you don't have any sub-nominals of Payroll then scroll down to where you see Control Liability 1, 2 etc. Click on Control Liability 1 and rename it to EWSS Control and click on Save.

3. When you know what grant you are entitled to you need to add a journal. Click on Accounts and Journals and add. Type in the date for the pay period that this EWSS amount relates to and click on Ok. Click on add new line on the next screen. Debit EWSS Control (BS), Credit EWSS Grant (P&L) and click on Save.

4. When you receive the grant income from Revenue, you need to record it as a MiscLodgment. First set up a Revenue EWSS Customer with type = Other. Click on Sales tab>Customers>Add. Type in Revenue EWSS, click on type where it shows Customer and change to Other. Click on Default Nominal and choose EWSS Control. Click on Ok.

5. If you're using the Bank Import facility for doing your bank payments when you see the payment from Revenue, click on Match, type Revenue EWSS in the Search box, choose Revenue EWSS from the section that says Payment on Account (or Misc) and add the payment there with payment type Bank Transfer or Direct Debit.

6. If you're still doing manual bank recs then click on Accounts tab and MiscLodgments and Add and choose Revenue EWSS, the date the payment was received, choose payment type bank transfer or direct debit and choose the bank account.

7. When you run your P&L report for the date period you should be able to see this amount towards the bottom of your P&L under 'Other Income: Grants'.

8. If you click on Reports, Ledger Reports and click on Nominal Activity V2 and from left hand side select EWSS Control, choose the dates and click on Apply, you should see the amounts coming in and going out. The journal will show the liability and the bank will show the amount received.